A GLEAM OF LIGHT
The white-capped attendant at the hospital led us up a flight of
broad, easy steps, to a large sunny room where convalescents were
allowed to try their new strength. Here "our man" was sitting in a
large arm-chair, wrapped in a blanket.
"He simply wouldn't stay in bed," the nurse explained in an undertone.
"He says he must go home, but he really isn't strong enough to walk
across the room without help."
"Is there anything the matter with him? Beyond exhaustion, I mean," I
asked. Jean had run across the room and was bending over the old man
with a coaxing concern in her face that was charming. She was like an
elfin sprite trying to express sympathy for some poor, huddled-up
toad.
"That's enough," said the nurse crisply. "No, there doesn't seem to be
anything else wrong. But it will take a week at least before he is
able to take care of himself. His mind will grow stronger as he does."
"Isn't his mind right?"
"You can talk to him," she said, non-committally. "Don't tire him."
And with that she left us.
Jean came running back to meet me and put me properly into touch with
things.
"He isn't happy," she explained hastily. "You must be cheerful, and
not bother him.--Here is Mr. Hilton who has come to see you, Mr.
Jordan. Now you can have a nice little talk with _him_." Her tone
indicated that this was indeed a privilege which might make up for
many slings from unkind fortune.
Mr. Jordan made an impatient gesture as though he would throw off the
blanket which was binding his arms.
"What am I doing here?" he asked querulously. "I want to get away. How
did I get here?"
"You fainted away on the street, Mr. Jordan," I answered. "We brought
you here to have you taken care of. Of course you may go as soon as
you are able to. Do you want to go home? Wouldn't it be best for some
member of your family or some friend to come for you?"
[Illustration: "_He was Diavolo's partner," he said vehemently_. Page
137.]
He let his chin sink upon his breast, and closed his eyes. Jean
telegraphed me a look of comment, interpretation and exhortation. I
half guessed what she meant, but I was too keen on my own trail to
consider making things easy for the old man.
"I believe you came to Saintsbury to look up Alfred Barker," I said,
quietly.
He did not answer or open his eyes, but I felt that his silence was
now alert instead of dormant, and presently a slow shiver ran over his
frame.
"It was a shock to you to find that he was dead, was it not?"
He roused himself to look at me. "I can't get at Diavolo except
through him. He was Diavolo's partner," he said vehemently.
"I am quite ready to believe that," I said heartily. But Jean had the
good sense not to be frivolous. She was smoothing the old man's hand
softly.
"Who is Diavolo?" she asked simply.
"If I knew! He was careful enough not to give his name." He was
trembling with excitement and his voice broke in his throat.
I began to see that this was a story which I must get, and also that I
should have to get it piecemeal from his distracted mind.
"Where did you meet Diavolo?" I asked.
"Why, at Eden Valley."
The name struck an echo in my brain. Of what was Eden Valley
reminiscent?
"What was he doing there?" I asked, questioning at hazard.
The old man clutched the arms of his chair with his hands and leaned
forward to look into my face. "You never heard of him?"
"Not a word."
He nodded heavily and sank back in his chair. "He gave a show," he
said dully. "In the Opery House. To show off how he could hypnotize
people." A slow tear gathered in his eye.
I began to get a coherent idea. "Oh, Diavolo was the name assumed for
show purposes by a man who went around giving exhibitions of
hypnotism. Is that it?"
"Yes."
"What did Alfred Barker have to do with it?"
"He was with him. He was the man that engaged the Opery House and done
the rest of the business. Diavolo kep' in the background. Nobody knows
who Diavolo was, but Alfred Barker left a trail I could follow."
Excitement had made his voice almost strong, and brought back a
momentary energy.
"What did you want to follow him for?"
His face worked with passion. "To get back my thousand!" he cried,
clenching his trembling hands.
"How did he get your thousand?"
"He got it from the bank, on a check he made me sign while I was
hypnotized!"
Suddenly I remembered,--Eden Valley, 32.00 plus 1000. That was a part
of the memoranda in Barker's note-book. A memorandum of the profits of
their trip! But I must understand it better.
"Did you let Diavolo hypnotize you?" I asked.
"I didn't think he could," the old farmer admitted, hanging his head.
"I thought my will was too strong for him to get control of me. He
called for people to come up from the audience and I laughed with the
rest to see him make fools of the boys,--making them eat tallow
candles for bananas, and scream when he threw a cord at them and said
it was a snake, and things like that. But I was mighty proud of my
strong will, and the boys dared me to go up and let him have a try at
me, so I went."
"And did he make you sign a check?" I asked, incredulously.
"Not then. That was too public. He knew his business too well for
that. But he got control of me." There was something pitiable in the
man's trembling admission. "He hypnotized me before I knew it, and
when I came to, I was standing on a chair in the middle of the stage,
trying to pull my pants up to my knees, because he had told me that I
was an old maid, and there was a mouse on the floor, and the boys out
in front were rolling over with laughter."
"That was very unkind," said Jean, indignantly.
"I was ashamed and I was mad," the old man continued, "and I knew the
boys would make everlasting fun of me, so next day I went up to see
him at the hotel. I thought if I could talk to him, man to man, and
without the fancy fixings of the stage, I could maybe find out how it
was did. He was pleasant and smiling and talked easy, and then I don't
remember one thing after that. Just a smoke in my mind. I suppose he
hypnotized me without my knowing it."
"That is possible, I suppose, since he had had control of your will
before. What next?"
"The next thing I knew, I was walking up the road home, feeling queer
and dizzy in my head. I couldn't remember how I got out of the hotel,
nor nothing. And I didn't know what had really happened until I went
to the bank to draw some money a month afterwards, and they told me I
had checked it all away."
"Is that possible?" I asked doubtfully.
"Easy enough," he said bitterly. "I could see it clear enough
afterwards. If he could make me believe I was an old maid afraid of a
mouse, couldn't he just as easy make me think I owed him a thousand
dollars and was making a check to pay it? I had my check book in my
pocket when I went there, and it showed my balance, of course, so it
was easy enough for them to find out how much they could ask for and
not get turned down by the bank. The last check was torn out but the
stub not filled in. And the bank showed me the canceled check all
right."
"Payable to whom?"
"To Alfred Barker. But he was only the hired man, I could see that.
Diavolo was the real one. Barker came and went when _he_ lifted his
finger. But Alfred Barker's name was on the check, so _his_ name
wouldn't show. I had time to think it all out afterwards."
It was an amazing story, but I could not pronounce it incredible,
especially when I recalled that significant "plus" of $1000 at Eden
Valley, in Barker's memorandum book.
"What did you do about it? Anything?"
"I tried to follow them. Diavolo showed in other places, and I thought
I could find them. I see there wasn't no use going to law about it,
because I couldn't deny that I had signed the check, and I understand
it ain't against the law to hypnotize a man. But if I could find them,
I bet I could get some satisfaction out of Barker's hide, if I could
catch him alone. I wasn't going to take any more chances with
Diavolo." He shuddered.
"You never caught up with them?"
"No. They had always just gone on. Then they stopped the show business
and I lost track of them, till I heard that Barker was in Saintsbury.
I came as fast as I could, but--I was too late." His head fell forward
on his breast, and he looked ready to collapse. His loss, the long
pursuit, the disheartening ending, had broken him.
Jean looked at me anxiously, and I understood, but it seemed to be too
important to get all the information possible from the old man at once
to give more than the barest consideration to his feelings. I poured a
little whiskey into the cup of my pocket flask, and after he had
choked it down he looked more equal to further cross-examination.
"Did you ever hear Barker address Diavolo by name?" I asked.
"No. I tell you he was the hired man."
"What did Diavolo look like?"
"He was about your height and build. Thin dark face. Long black hair
and a soft black beard. Queer eyes that gave you the shivers."
It was not an identifying description. Probably nineteen men out of
twenty are of my height and build, which is in all respects medium;
the long hair and black beard were probably stage properties; and the
queer eyes might be merely Mr. Jordan's afterthought of what the
hypnotizer's eyes ought to be.
"Would you know him again if you saw him without his hair and beard?"
He looked surprised, and then doubtful. "I don't know."
But at this point the attendant nurse came up, and intimated plainly
that I was a trespasser and transgressor, and that the interview was
ended.
"I'll come to-morrow and take you out for a drive, if the doctor
thinks you are strong enough to go," I said, by way of keeping the
door open for further details.
"I must go home," he said, querulously.
"The faster you get strong, the sooner you can go. Till to-morrow,
then."
Jean walked beside me quietly and sedately till we were outside. Then
she turned to me with a flash of intense feeling.
"What are you going to do for him?"
"Find Diavolo," I answered promptly.
"And make him give back the thousand dollars?"
"If possible," I answered absently. My mind was more actively engaged
with other features of the story than with the defrauding of the old
farmer, and I was not sorry when I could put Jean on her car, so that
I could wander off by myself to think the matter over. How far, if at
all, this affair of Diavolo might have a bearing upon the murder
mystery was uppermost in my mind. Suppose Diavolo and his "hired man"
had quarreled. Suppose they had quarreled to the death? It was, of
course, quite probable that a man of Barker's type would have many
enemies, but here I was dealing not with probabilities but with a
fact, however small it might be. There had been, in the recent
past, an intimate relation between Barker and a man who was capable
of touring the country as a hypnotist, a man who concealed his
identity,--Ha, a motive! They had quarreled over the division of the
thousand dollars, and Barker had threatened to expose him! His own
death had followed! This chain had developed so rapidly and vividly in
my imagination that it was a cold shock when my common sense recalled
that I must establish some connection between Diavolo and Gene Benbow
to make the thread complete. Whatever part Gene had played or had not
played in the tragedy itself, he had confessed to the shot. The
confession itself was a fact and must be accounted for, whether the
thing confessed was a fact or not.
Up to this time the only theory in my mind that was compatible with
Gene's innocence was the theory of romantic self-sacrifice on his
part. I had felt that if he was not guilty he was trying to save
someone who was. Whom would Gene Benbow wish to save at any cost? Who
had killed Barker? Who was Diavolo? Would one name answer all three
questions?
That was what I must find out.